SEA83FU007 · Airmass SUNBURST
Airmass SUNBURST · Accident: airframe, component or system failure while maneuvering
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA83FU007
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 1 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Airmass SUNBURST
- Aircraft type
- Airmass SUNBURST
- Category
- Ultralight
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- UNREG
- Operator
- Jeffery Castanga
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 103: Ultralight
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Maneuvering
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Airframe, component or system failure
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, excessive
- Pilot in command › Design stress limits of aircraft, excessive
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Tacoma, WA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE ULTRALIGHT HAD PREVIOUSLY FLOWN TO TACOMA WITH 2 PHANTOM ULTRALIGHTS IN PREPARATION FOR THE AIRSHOW. DURING DESCENT THE 3 ACFT HAD REACHED SPEEDS OF 75-80 MPH. AFTER LANDING, ONE OF PHANTOM PLTS ASKED THE SUNBURST PLT IF HE KNEW HOW FAST HE WAS GOING AND HE ANSWERED '...NO,NOT REALLY...' THE SUNBURST WAS EQUIPPED WITH A GRADUATED PLASTIC TUBE WITH A MOVABLE FLOAT TO INDICATE AIRSPEED. THE TOP MARK IS '55.' DURING THE AIRSHOW WITNESSES OBSERVED THE ACFT STARTING A DESCENDING LEFT TURN, THEN SUDDENLY 'JERKED' TO THE RIGHT, PITCHING UP ABOUT 10 DEG. THE RIGHT WING WENT BACKWARDS, THENBOTH WINGS ROTATED UPWARDS. THE LEFT WING FRONT SPAR WAS FOUND PULLED OUTWARD FROM THE BOLT & ALUMINUM SPACER. THE RIGHTWING REAR SPAR WAS SEPARATED FROM THE BOLT & BRACKET. THE RIGHT WING FLYING CABLES SEPARATED AT THE RIGHT REAR CARRY THROUGH ATTACHMENT POINT. THE PLTS BLOOD ALCOHOL LEVEL WAS 0.05%.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA83FU007
- Event ID
- 20001214X43941
- Case number
- SEA83FU007
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1983-07-05.
- API snapshot SHA-256: d1d7a8bd9b8ad6801d52982c979b757df9bf1ce2f5289b9757dc1117206b83b1; retrieved 2026-09-21T06:32:20.572Z.